ICL has announced plans to invest $30 million to develop a customer innovation and qualification centre (CIQC) for the energy storage systems market in North America. This should become “a hub for ICL, its partners and its customers, as the company looks to make significant advancements in its battery materials R&D capabilities”, ICL said.
ICL has held the groundbreaking ceremony for a $400 million, 13,000 m2, 30,000 tones/year battery materials manufacturing facility at its Carondolet site at St Louis, Missouri. Present at the event on 8 August were Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm, whose department granted $197 million towards building the facility under the Investing in America agenda, and Missouri governor Mike Parson.
ICL has concluded a five-year €250 million ‘sustainability-linked loan’ from syndicate of five global lenders at 0.8%/year interest. It is the first company in Israel to do so. This is part of its sustainability efforts and includes three performance targets.
ICL will seek to achieve a 4-5% reduction in direct and indirect Scope 1 and Scope 2 CO2 emissions resulting from global operations. Third party monitoring will begin in the 2021 fiscal year, in accordance with the accounting and reporting standards published by the GHG Protocol.
The world’s two largest speciality chemical distributors, Brenntag and Univar Solutions, have both concluded further acquisitions, disposals and deals in 2021. This follows on from numerous such advances by their rivals, Azelis and IMCD, in 2020.
Israel’s ICL has agreed to acquire Fertiláqua, one of Brazil’s largest speciality plant nutrition companies from private equity firm Aqua Capital for about $120 million. The company said that this will expand its portfolio and significantly enhance its customer base and presence across agriculture regions in Brazil.
